


Butterfly Wings

by gingerisourqueen



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Kid Fic, M/M, School
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-02
Updated: 2012-04-19
Packaged: 2017-11-02 22:00:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,151
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/373787
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gingerisourqueen/pseuds/gingerisourqueen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kid!fic. Sherlock's mother once told him that butterflies can't see their wings. They never get to see how beautiful they really are, even though everyone else can. On Sherlock's first day of kindergarten, he meets Jim, the only boy who was ever able to see his wings.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

It was a sunny day.

The sky was a brilliant blue with the occasional tuft of white. The long grass rustled in the wind as it stretched across the open hills. Yellow butterflies with speckles of black danced playfully within its depths. Pink and white flowers dotted the green fields and bees buzzed merrily between them. In one of the many valleys was a small pond surrounded by cattails. Lily pads floated above the blue-green water and a frog jumped effortlessly into its murky depths. There was a wood not far off, the strong smell of pine drifted over to where a group of kindergarteners were huddled. A young woman with a short, black, pixie cut and sparkling blue eyes stood before them. She wore a warm red dress and an even warmer smile. Her cheeks went pink when she smiled, her cherry red lips stretched across her pearly white teeth as she beamed at her new class. The children shrieked with glee as she told them they would have half an hour to play before they would have to head back. They all ran off in different directions, the girls went to pick flowers and chase butterflies while the boys set about catching frogs and climbing trees.

Sherlock Holmes stood still.

Eventually, the teacher came over and knelt in front of him, putting her hands on his shoulders as she did so. There was a band of gold around the fourth finger on her left hand and her breath smelt of apples and nutmeg as she spoke. "Why don't you want to play with the others?" she asked. She was still smiling, but Sherlock could see the concern in her eyes.

He shrugged his shoulders, looking past her, watching as a group of boys chased a rabbit out of the forest. "Who would want to play with me?" he said simply, kicking at the dirt before looking back up at her.

"Funny," she said, smiling for real now, "you're the second person to say that to me today." With that, she stood up and clasped his small hand in hers before leading him away from the others and to a tree he hadn't noticed before. It was a crab apple tree, covered in white blossoms and a couple green apples were already started to grow. The trunk of the tree was intricately woven in and around itself, making unexpected dips and turns at every corner. Sherlock loved it. Perched on one of the branches was another boy his age, he had messy brown hair and was currently hunched over, inspecting something Sherlock couldn't see. The boy looked over his shoulder when he heard them approaching, clasping his hands together in his lap. For a moment, his eyes met Sherlock's and they stared at each other. He had dark eyes, darker than Sherlock would have thought possible, and something about the way the sunlight caught them made them look surreal, as if the boy could see something everyone else couldn't.

The teacher watched them look at each other for a moment before saying, "Sherlock, I would like you to meet James. James, Sherlock." She glanced at them both again. "I'll leave you two to it then," she said, before disappearing off to check up on the other children.

Finally, Sherlock broke the stare and instead focused on the rest of the boy, James, the teacher had said. He was wearing a red shirt and some worn out grey jeans that were covered in rips and patches. His black second hand shoes were getting holes near the toes where the fabric had worn out and his shoelaces didn't match. But the boy didn't seem to mind, so neither did Sherlock.

Sherlock picked his way over fallen flower petals and crab apples to where the boy was perched. "May I come up?" he asked. The boy shrugged, moving over a bit on the branch while still keeping his hands firmly cupped together around whatever he was holding. Sherlock smiled his thanks before setting about climbing up the branches. It wasn't hard, Sherlock had climbed trees enough times with Mycroft in the field behind their estate to know what to use as handholds and steps. Soon he was sitting next to the other boy who had watched his climb with mild interest. He stuck out a hand, it was only the polite thing to do, "I'm Sherlock," he said proudly.

The other boy looked down at Sherlock's hand and then back at his already occupied ones. He gave Sherlock and apologetic smile,"I'm James, but everyone ca... well, I like to be called Jim," he said in a rather high pitched Irish accent.

"Nice to meet you Jim," he paused for a moment before adding, "what are you holding?" He had been dying to know, Mycroft had always said he couldn't resist a mystery. Jim hesitated a moment before pulling apart his fingers a bit so Sherlock could see inside. His eyes widened when he saw what Jim had caught, fluttering pathetically in his hands was a small butterfly. It had yellow dusty wings and, no, wait, there was only one wing, where had the other one gone? A quick glance at Jim told him all he needed to know. The dark haired boy was watching the thing flail helplessly with great interest, his eyes lighting up when it started trying to flip itself over.

"Does it bother you?" Jim looked at Sherlock expectantly.

Sherlock scoffed. "No," he had a huge collection of butterflies and other insects at home, all neatly pinned in frames. He'd spent hours admiring them, memorizing the different names and species. Sherlock loved butterflies, they were so fascinatingly complex and elegant for something so simple.

The butterfly was spinning itself in circles now in an attempt to regain its footing, eventually going limp. Bored, Jim unclasped his hands, watching as the butterfly fluttered helplessly to the ground, joining the cluster of white petals already surrounding the base of the tree. He turned back to Sherlock, smiling, "I think we're going to get along just fine." The corner of Sherlock's mouth twitched as he stared at his new friend.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> To be perfectly honest I haven't written any more of this fic than what I have here, but I have plenty of things I want to do with it so if you would like to see more please let me know!

As the apples ripened and began to fall from the tree, and the leaves turned gold and the grass yellowed, Sherlock and Jim became inseparable. They were the only ones in their grade who were part of both the morning and the afternoon classes; Sherlock because his mother was never at home, and Jim because his dad didn’t want him home. That was one trait they had noticed they shared right away, both of them came from single parent families. Sherlock had no idea who his father was, or where he was, or if he was even alive. And he didn’t waste much time thinking about it. As far as he was concerned, Sherlock Holmes had no father. Sherlock never bothered to ask Jim about his mother; it wasn’t any of his business so why should he care?

He and Jim did have a good education. Even before starting school they had known how to read, write and basic arithmetic. It was easy to say they were both at the top of their class. Being a Holmes, this was only expected of him, but Jim had come away beaming after he had found out. He had later confessed to Sherlock that he had spent the whole summer beforehand reading anything he could get his hands on, making day long trips to the library just as an excuse to get out of the house. Like Matilda, Sherlock had thought, but he hadn’t dared say anything. Unfortunately, being ahead of all your classmates wasn’t exactly ideal when you spend the afternoon relearning exactly the same thing you were taught in the morning. It was three weeks into the year and they were already bored out of their minds.

They would sit next to each other in class, dreading when the lunch bell would ring and everyone else would get to go home. Then it was lunchtime, where Sherlock and Jim would be ushered into the cafeteria where all the older boys and girls ate their lunches. Sherlock would pull out a blue lunch tin, and from that maybe a thermos of soup, or a wrap. Jim would provide a crunched up paper bag, always containing the same squished cheese sandwich, mumbling something about not having enough time in the morning. Eventually, Sherlock started offering halves of sandwiches or cups of soup to Jim, sometimes his entire lunch, insisting he wasn’t hungry. At first, Jim always politely declined, but after a while when Sherlock started saying the uneaten food would just be going in the rubbish anyways, Jim began accepting his offers. They would eat lunch in silence, sharing bags of carrots, occasionally pointing out teachers who hadn’t worn makeup that day, or when a girl had just been crying. Deductions, Jim had called them. Sherlock liked that word, he liked the way it rolled off his tongue and how it made him sound clever. They had soon made a game out of it, pointing out things about the people around them, always trying to one up the other.

“I think someone’s in looove” Jim had sung one day, nodding his head in the direction of a girl who was a year or two older then them. Her eyes had been glued on a boy who sat across from her almost the entire lunch, and she’d hardly touched her food, too lost in some elaborate story he was explaining. The girl had big brown eyes and a charm bracelet dangled around her wrist. The boy had sandy blonde hair and was fairly fit. Sherlock could see his muscles flex as he drank from a water bottle before continuing on, enjoying the attention he was getting.

Sherlock snorted. “That’s Carl Powers. I heard one of the teachers talking to him yesterday.” Jim glanced at the boy again. “He looks like a right prick.”

Sherlock raised his eyebrows but a smile was creeping across his lips. “Shh! We’re in school! You’re not supposed to know what that means yet!”

“Then how come you do?” Jim smiled triumphantly. “Anyways, I’ve heard loads worse.” He took a bite of Sherlock’s apple, the soft skin splitting between his teeth with a loud crunch. Sherlock looked at the boy sitting across from him. He never knew how to react when Jim said something like that. He had deduced easily enough that things weren’t exactly perfect at home for him, but he also knew that Jim wouldn’t care much for him asking about it, so he kept his mouth shut. Jim was still chewing when he said, “I was thinking we should go down to that park again, tomorrow, at lunch.” He shrugged his shoulders, “Besides, we’re not even supposed to be here, so we can’t get in trouble.”

Sherlock considered this for a moment. They hadn’t been back to the park since their first day, and he did want to try a crab apple from that tree, he’d never had one before. “Alright.” He said. Jim grinned at him happily, bits of apple showing between his teeth.

\- - - - -

The next day they walked back to school, chattering happily with hands full of reddened crab apples. They had spent the past forty minutes up in the tree, feet dangling over the branches as they shared stories. Sherlock had told Jim about Mycroft and all the nannies they had gotten to quit by being as irritating and mean as possible. Jim had told him made up stories, about dragons and wizards and far away places. He described evil kings and ruthless pirates, he told him of ancient prophecies and forgotten destinies, he conjured up images of great villains and even greater heroes. Mummy would have called it childish, but Sherlock was enthralled, clinging to each of Jim’s words with rapt attention. Right now, Jim was telling him something called, “Hansel and Gretel”, Sherlock’s mouth watered as he described the gingerbread house the little boy and girl had ended up in.

“…the floor was made of candy canes and the walls of gingerbread. The windows were made of sugar crystals and the ledges were out of frosting. Stuck into the walls were huge gumdrops, bigger than your head and in every colour you could imagine. Chocolate tables sat on wafer sticks and were piled high with every kind of cupcake, cookie and cake that has ever been invented. There were chairs made out of cotton candy and marsh-” he stopped short. Their teacher, Mrs. White, was walking up to meet them just as they approached the school. Sherlock and Jim exchanged nervous glances, for maybe the first time since meeting her, Mrs. White wasn’t smiling.

“What do you think you two were doing running off like that?” she snapped, eyes flickering between the two boys.

**Author's Note:**

> Eeek! Hope you enjoyed that, I have a bit of a next chapter written, but not much, so if you want me to continue please let me know!


End file.
